Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia–A New Hope of Malaysia or An Old Wine in a New Bottle

Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia–A New Hope of Malaysia or An Old Wine in a New Bottle

Mahathir probably knows this, but perhaps he thinks that the only way to win a general election is to sway the Malays to a party that maintains the character of the pre-Najib UMNO. Nevertheless, it is still too early to tell what exactly the new party is all about. Perhaps the old doctor still has one last great operation to perform.–Scott Ng

There was a lot of excitement among pro-opposition pundits when former PM Mahathir Mohamad announced last month that he was setting up a new party. Many saw it as a major step forward in the fight against the Najib regime.

However, the news that the party will be another Bumi-only party has taken the wind out of the sails somewhat. The worry is that it will merely be a ship for Umno’s castaways and defectors to jump on to whether or not they subscribe to reformist principles.

Mahathir faces the challenge of legitimising this party in the eyes of both the Malay voters disaffected by BN and the opposition supporters who look upon him with justifiable suspicion.

The challenge does not end there. The enthroning of Muhyiddin Yassin as the party’s president and its candidate for Prime Minister presents another problem. He has acquired the image of an unwilling contender and he hasn’t exactly been a unifying figure since his sacking from Umno.

Muhyiddin will have to project more dynamism if the party hopes to capture the imagination of the opposition masses. His penchant for whining over his unceremonious sacking has irked those who were waiting to see the emergence of a champion.

This new party cannot be UMNO 3.0. It has to represent a clear break from the legacy instituted by Mahathir himself in UMNO Baru. If it is to spearhead the opposition campaign for GE-14, it has to disown UMNO politics, UMNO rhetoric and the UMNO mentality.

Mahathir probably knows this, but perhaps he thinks that the only way to win a general election is to sway the Malays to a party that maintains the character of the pre-Najib UMNO. Nevertheless, it is still too early to tell what exactly the new party is all about. Perhaps the old doctor still has one last great operation to perform.

22 thoughts on “Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia–A New Hope of Malaysia or An Old Wine in a New Bottle”

UMNO is confident enough of its support from the Malays to allow the registration of this new party.

I will keep an open mind. I wish Tan Sri Muhiddin Yassin all the best. Some months ago during one of my trips home, I met the former DPM at his office in Damansara Heights for a rather longish chat. He appeared to have some good ideas about the economic and social empowerment of the Malays.

I said that UMNO of the Tunku and Tun Razak eras did good for my generation. That was long ago. But I agreed with him that the present UMNO culture cannot hold if Malaysia is to prosper and get out its current mess. It has to be empowerment, he said, not affirmative action UMNO style. I am not sure this party can attract enough support to unseat UMNO and bring about serious reform. I fear It may suffer the same fate as Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah’s Semangat 46.–Din Merican

If the new party does not promote equity for all communities Malaysia will remain in it is usual mode of tension between the races. The Malays cannot continue to clzim privileges while sucking the sweat and blood of the non Malays. The NEP era should be wiped off.

I can only pray and hope that BERSATU can reform from the umno (baru). I wish the other opposition parties can align themselves to this new party of hope. In this connection DAP ought to be sincere, PKR can remain a multi racial party while AMANAH
ought to dissolve and join BERSATU to have a strong bumiputra base.

I am putting my head in the clouds here to have AMANAH joining BERSATU. But the the Indians are not represented by its own party.

It would utopia if PKR can be solely an Indian party while its Chinese members embrace DAP.

With such an arrangement we can have a level playing field (to have a robust head on collision with BN), so to speak in the form of a BARISAN RAKYAT coalition party?

Remember “too many cooks spoil the soup”

DAP, AMANAH and PKR will have to put their heads together on this.

Its my dream anyway but i am glad to have spoken my mind. I shall dream on…….

Few years back I asked a political scientist well versed in Malaysian affairs why there were so many Parties to cater for the Chinese and Indians whereas the Malays have only UMNO and PAS. He said the Malay Government would be only too happy to allow registration of more Parties from them so that they will be divided and their strength diluted allowing the Malays to be rock solid against them.

For any Party to succeed it has to be Malay-interests centered at least for a short term until the economic targets set for Malays (whatever they may be) are reached. So Mahathir new “Bersatu” Party will be slicing away Malay support from UMNO. Overall there is no damage done to Malay unity as the trend over the last few years shows that the Malays always vote for Malay and Malay-dominated Parties overwhelmingly. There is nothing much in for the others to look forward to with this new development.

“The NEP era should be wiped off”. You have to convince the Malays first. It is difficult as it is too big a Paradigm shift in their thinking. It has to be gradually abolished. It may even take another generation but it has to be done and the Malay leadership must show their sincerity that they mean it. It is easier said than done.

“Membership is open to all Malaysians who are bumiputera Malays, natives of Sabah and Sarawak and the Orang Asli,” Muhyiddin said. “Membership is also open to other Malaysians as associate members. They have the same rights as other members except they cannot vote or contest for party positions but they can be appointed to any position within the party.

Wait.. the above is progressive? Why do we need cari-makan non-Malay in this party again? Free loader MCA cabinet ministers not good enuff meh? Regressive! 😛

Is it not the proper time to discard political parties based on race. Why cant it be based on the concept f an egalitarian society based on need rather than race. An equitable society breed prosperity, racially divisive society promotes alienation and hate an as such Malaysia will not progress among the nations of this world.

The whole exercise, nothing more nothing less, is to oust Najib and to do that Bersatu has to attract UMNO members away from UMNO because while being inside UMNO any action or attempt to oust Najib would be labelled as treachery against race and religion, something which all Malays since birth were brained washed against.

So allowing non-Bumis equal status in Bersatu would be self-defeating, and of course an amalgamation with UMNO itself would be on the cards once Najib is ousted. There is no way non-Bumis can be given full membership status when that happens.

UMNO members, both incumbants and inducted Bersatu Malays, will have no problem accepting “second-class” members, just as there is no problem with non-Bumis as second-class citizens.

I suppose the fun really begins as Mahathir now has a clear political platform and agenda to legitimately challenge Najib and promote his son?

The king-makers however are still those UMNO Baru members still in UMNO baru. If they migrate en mass out of UMNO Baru, Najib is of course dead, otherwise Mahathir will die a broken may be even a forgotten man because frankly there is nothing else more he can do after this; a sad end to a brilliant person who for his faults had developed Malaysia so much so that Najib could embezzle billions and billions and the country still manages to stay as a viable economic entity, China’s “help” notwithstanding.

This Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia is still a race and religion based party because it is not based reality and meritocracy, cannot help Malays and resolve Malaysia’s problems, like the UMNO of the Tunku and Tun Razak eras when we had strong leadership like Lee Kuan Yew of Singapore who was part of Malaysia at the time was being kicked out Malaysia led by Malays.

You can’t mix politics with religion, worse still if race included, This is very dangerous, could lead to terrorism, like IS.

9th August is the date the ROS registered the Party. The Party’s application date may be something else. Where in the world can a political party apply for registration today and get it approved today? Still the date may be significant in the
sense that Singapore left Malaysia on that day and became a success story, which the new Party may want to emulate by having broken away from UMNO. I thought Mahathir had cerebral dislike for Singapore. Najib should query ROS, why give that date – to embarrass Mahathir?

Hawking Eye August 10, 2016 at 1:13 pm
9th August is the date the ROS registered the Party…..
Still the date may be significant in the sense that Singapore left Malaysia on that day and became a success story, which the new Party may want to emulate by having broken away from UMNO. ///

This date was also the day the US dropped a second atomic bomb on Nagasaki. (Hiroshima was bombed on 6th August). So, is the ROS trying to nuke the new party, or the new party trying to nuke UMNO?

Ahh… race relations of Malaysia. Like it or not racial politics is very much alive and kicking in this country. It is even enshrined in our Constitution (I can’t find the exact passage but I’ve read there are provisions for certain “priliveges” to the “bumiputeras” *no connotations, just the label the Constitution uses*).

That’s not to say that this is healthy or right. In fact so far it has only resulted in misery and stunted growth for this nation, when our elites abused their power using race politics for selfish gains.

I’m always of the thinking that life is fair. The laws of physics does not discriminate, and everything happens for a reason. Like a game of cards we can only play with the hand we’re dealt with.

It just so happened that history, through past colonisations, has resulted in the bringing together of three groups of people with extremely diverse social and cultural background together in the same piece of land. The land we now call Malaysia, our home.

Through the indoctrination of our so called leaders, the different groups had been, in my (simple minded?) view, engaged in a decades long war. A war of attrition. No one side is willing to even contemplate any sort of compromise. It’s my way or the highway. All of them, through their own believes, misplaced most probably, that time is on their side.

We had many many chances since independence to forge a unified identiy, but at critical junctures, such opportunities had always been hijacked by forces in power. I have been blessed to have a “little bit more” exposure studying and working with all Malaysians than average. And even then I wouldn’t consider this as adequate enough. But from these experiences, I can CONFIDENTLY state that all the raw ingredients for a unified and prosperous Malaysia is already here with us.

The world is evermore changing at a faster pace. Major geo-political events are happening around this region. Malaysia of all the South East Asian countries is perhaps the most strategically important one.

We are running out of time to get our house in order before we are faced with the inevitable time for the Big Geo-political Bargain of East Asia. I think we have at most 20 years. We need all the chips we can muster, and secure a meaningful seat at the table if we are to hope for a positive outcome.

The easy way out is of course to do nothing and have UMNO/Malay members to switch to PBBM. Tun M, is merely doing the ‘Ketam Bertukar Kulit’. Just like ‘Ketam ajar anak berjalan’, the same PM 1Najib would come about in PBBM, and it will be a costlier experience then.

Kicking the can down the road! Awesome kiasu/kiasi mentality very much a tradisi Melayu now.

We love Tun M’s pick, as another Jho Low in another name would come about to help him (I presume it would be a him in Malaysia’s takBoleh world) with an easy way out in this AliBaba business model. Naive us is barking up the wrong tree when we would expect Tun M could provide a solution to a unique systemic problem he has created. All non-Malay sycophants would love to be an AliBaba associate, just like Jho Low. But be careful this time. The next Baba associate might actually have the real Chinese ‘AliBaba’ connection this time, and he/she would no reason to be loyal to the ‘Ali’ this time. Then, the Melayu would definitely become a neo-slave race, just like how the Mexicans serve Americans, not merely a protected lot like the native American Indians. Exactly like how @Shonen has described.

Of course, I would love to be wrong, and keen on learning what PBBM would do to prevent itself from falling into the same UMNO money politics trap. But, from the wording I have seen so far, and the lethargic people gathered in the team, there is nothing for anyone to get excited about.

Malaysia first, or Melayu first. It is of no difference. Layu it would be, if there is all PBBM has to offer is to ‘ketam bertukar kulit’

/// It just so happened that history, through past colonisations, has resulted in the bringing together of three groups of people with extremely diverse social and cultural background together in the same piece of land. The land we now call Malaysia, our home.

Through the indoctrination of our so called leaders, the different groups had been, in my (simple minded?) view, engaged in a decades long war. A war of attrition. No one side is willing to even contemplate any sort of compromise. It’s my way or the highway. ///

This same past colony and explosive of diverse cultural and ethnic mix obtains in Singapore, yet the outcomes are very different. As you pointed out, the difference is in the leadership. One set of leaders tried to divide and conquer in order to stay in power; whereas the other set of leaders tried to bring their people together.